Does anybody here read literature on the Immanuel Kant vs Ayn Rand debate on epistemology? Is Rand an empiricist in the sense of Locke and Hume? I would think that her individualism is influenced by Locke's tabula rasa, all men are equal in the sense that they are born a blank slate and are differentiated through interaction with the environment. What is her rebuttal to Kant's arguments against the British empiricists? Particularly the statement that humans engage the world through the 'lens' of causality, space and time. It would seem a bit weird if Rand actually held on to the empiricism of Locke and Hume, since their epistemology was mostly dead during the time of Ayn Rand. I have not yet read the works of Ayn Rand, forgive me for my ignorance on the matter.
Ayn Rand is garbage, if the book 'Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology' is representative for her views. Which I think it is.
And it's not that she's an empiricist as such; she has just this weird idea rejecting synthetic a priori. 'All statements are logically truth or false. There are no statements that 'might be true' but 'are wrong'.
She relies heavy on Aristotelian abstraction and all; not empiricism.
The state is not the enemy. The idea of the state is.
Rand was a great rhetorician, a top-notch pseudo-intellectual, and astonishingly clueless about the real epistemology and logic of libertarian or economic thought.
She's a great starting point for getting socialists to recognize the value and superiority of liberty, but then they need to move on to something more mature.
Really, she tends to depend on circular reasoning for her claims of epistemological foundation. For example, she actually asserts at some point that if you can't define something without using it in the definition, that's axiomatic, a long-disproven fallacy, and yet at another point ignores even that limit to her wild speculation. Whatever fallacy is convenient for her agenda.
To be fair, my analysis of Rothbard is much the same, although slightly kinder...a good starting point, but a lot of unhealthy fallacies. One should then move on to sounder libertarian thinkers.
Kaz could you give me a citations where she has written what you say? I mean this:
"For example, she actually asserts at some point that if you can't define something without using it in the definition, "
I never read that anywere in her books. Looking forward to your answer.
Lode in that case would you say that Willard Quine is also garbage? Because he also has critiqued the analytic synthetic distinction. See here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytic%E2%80%93synthetic_distinction#Quine.27s_criticism
Are you saying that any philosopher that does not agree with the A/S distinction is garbage? That's a very weird statement to say the least.
"'All statements are logically truth or false. There are no statements that 'might be true' but 'are wrong'. "
That is a misstatement of her position. Full quote please? Because that is not the way she would have said that. She would have said that there are some things we do not know enough about. In those cases we can not make a definitive statement about the truth of the proposition.
Kenneth decide for yourself what you think of Ayn Rands ideas. Just read her own words and see what you think about it.
Btw I have had my issues with some of Rands ideas as well. For a time I was completely turned of by her thinking. But noticing recently that most of the critique she is getting these days is either by people who are misreading her, or misunderstanding here or by argumentum ad hominem I am finding a new sympathy with her and her philosophy.
Kenneth,
David Hume was not a tabula rasa empiricist.
This is Hume on causation in A Treatise of Human Nature:
Shall we then rest contented with these two relations of contiguity and succession, as affording a complete idea of causation? By, no means. An object may be contiguous and prior to another, without being considered as its cause. There is a NECESSARY CONNEXION to be taken into consideration; and that relation is of much greater importance, than any of the other two above-mention’d.Here again I turn the object on all sides, in order to discover the nature of this necessary connexion, and find the impression, or impressions, from which its idea may be deriv’d. When I cast my eye on the known Qualities of objects, I immediately discover that the relation of cause and effect depends not in the least on them. When I consider their relations, I can find none but those of contiguity and succession; which I have already regarded as imperfect and unsatisfactory.1 (…)
What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together. Upon this head I repeat what I have often had occasion to observe, that as we have no idea, that is not deriv’d from an impression, we must find some impression, that gives rise to this idea of necessity, if we assert we have really such an idea. In order to this I consider, in what objects necessity is commonly suppos’d to lie; and finding that it is always ascrib’d to causes and effects, I turn my eye to two objects suppos’d to be plac’d in that relation; and examine them in all the situations, of which they are susceptible. I immediately perceive, that they are contiguous in time and place, and that the object we -call cause precedes the other we call effect. In no one instance can I go any farther, nor is it possible for me to discover any third relation betwixt these objects. I therefore enlarge my view to comprehend several instances; where I find like objects always existing in like relations of contiguity and succession. At first sight this seems to serve but little to my purpose. The reflection on several instances only repeats the same objects; and therefore can never give rise to a new idea. But upon farther enquiry I find, that the repetition is not in every particular the same, but produces a new impression, and by that means the idea, which I at present examine. For after a frequent repetition, I find, that upon the appearance of one of the objects, the mind is determin’d by custom to consider its usual attendant, and to consider it in a stronger light upon account of its relation to the first object. ‘Tis this impression, then, or determination, which affords me the idea of necessity.(…)
I begin with observing that the terms of efficacy, agency, power, force, energy, necessity, connexion, and productive quality, are all nearly synonymous; and therefore ’tis an absurdity to employ any of them in defining the rest. (…)
The idea of necessity arises from some impression. There is no impression convey’d by our senses, which can give rise to that idea. It must, therefore, be deriv’d from some internal impression, or impression of reflection(…)
This therefore is the essence of necessity. Upon the whole, necessity is something, that exists in the mind, not in objects; nor -is it possible for us ever to form the most distant idea of it, considered as a quality in bodies. (…)
the necessity or power, which unites causes and effects, lies in the determination of the mind to pass from the one to the other.
Thus we have here something much closer to the active mind of Kant than to the passive mind of Locke, which makes sense given that Kant said that reading Hume awoke him from his dogmatic slumbers.
Yes Rand is an empiricist - the greatest empiricist of them all - but she is not an empiricist like Locke or Descartes.
Kant's errors are manifest in his epistemology so it would be difficult to explain all his errors but, in a nutshell, Kant makes the same mistake that Locke made in his assumption of a primary v. secondary quality distinction [ an error which Locke inherited from Galileo, I believe].
Rand's breakthrough was her grasp that the Lockean pattern of cognition ie sensations>percepts>concepts is essentially false - in reality percepts and NOT sensations are the given primaries, so the process goes percepts>concepts/senations, as we do not really experience sensations apart from entities. This at a stroke solves the whole Kantian/Humean conundrum see Objectivism the Philosophy of Ayn Rand by L. Peikoff. Now I realise that the whole scientific and philosophical establishment are convinced that the senses do deceive us but the fact is they do not and cannot deceive us. Rand is correct and slowly getting recognition for this fact - how quickly you grasp this truth will depend on how smart you are.
Of course that still leaves open the question - how do we get from percepts to concepts, which Rand answered in her jaw-dropping 'Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology' - be sure to read the expanded edition.
Well; obviously opinions are divided.
Kaz, I'm just curious, what fallacies do you see in Rothbard's claims?
Rand's breakthrough
Uh, don't you mean Aristotle/Aquinas? Rand didn't invent this stuff, you know. Her philosophy is just a mashed up mix between Aristotle's realism, and Nietzsche's übermenschen.
I was answering Kenneth's question about empiricism - and no Aristotle did not have an adequate grasp of consciousness nor the nature of the sensory form.
And Rand has nothing in common with Nietsche's superman.